Kogi battles ghost workers

Kogi State has uncovered over 25,000 ghost workers, and vows to fish out more, reports JOSEPH JIBUEZE

Over 25,000 ghost workers in Kogi State have met their tether’s end. Some of these dubious elements were said to have been defrauding the state for as long as 10 years. Now the state, in an ambitious move, has ensured that they no longer drain the resources of the state.

The ghost-worker menace is a nationwide malaise, which President Muhammadu Buhari wants the Continuous Audit Team to tackle, alongside overpayment of allowances and outright embezzlement.

In June, the team found discrepancies in the payroll of ministries, departments and agencies, which cost the Federal Government about N5.7billion monthly.

Its head, Mohammed Dikwa, said the team has helped save about N50billion, adding that over 43,000 ghost workers have been struck off the payroll.

Most states are also affected. For instance, Plateau uncovered 5,000 ghost workers recently, while Sokoto uncovered 12,915 two weeks ago. With resources getting leaner and federal allocations dwindling, resulting in inability to pay salaries, more states are embarking on staff audit to eliminate fraudulent salary earners.

On assumption of office, Governor Yahaya Bello, in line with his civil service reform policy, set up the Staff Verification and Screening Committee on February 22.

Its mandate was to ascertain the true position of the state and local government workforce with a view to optimising Kogi’s human and financial resources for development.

The committee’s leadership was later reshuffled following reports that it was sabotaging the exercise. A backup committee was further set up on May 24 and tasked with supporting the main committee to restore discipline, integrity and transparency to the screening exercise. On June 22, the committee submitted its report to the governor.

It uncovered 25,103 ghost workers, as well as cases of impersonation of dead workers by staff who earned the deceased’s salaries.

The report, presented to Governor Bello by the Auditor-General, Alhaji Usman Yusuf Okala, says those on the state’s payroll have been reduced following the exercise.

The findings

According to the report, as at February 22, the state had 88, 973 staff on its nominal payroll, with a monthly wage bill of N5,809,578,703. At the conclusion of the exercise on July 24, the cleared and validated workforce was 63,870.

The 25,103 staff included unintended beneficiaries who had been drawing salaries fraudulently from the state and Local Government finances. “The estimated current monthly wage bills of cleared and validated workforce after the conclusion of our report was N4,443,070,644,” Okala said.

According to him, the state lost over N213billion in the last 13 years to ghost workers but would save over N1.4billion on a monthly basis, which would have gone to ghost workers, thanks to the verification. “These savings will amount to N16,387,296,713.88 per annum,” he added.

On cases of impersonation, the report says: “These are set of dubious and notorious people who are claiming the employment benefits (salary & allowances) of some deceased civil servants of the state and Local Governments for as far back as 10 years.

“Unfortunately, no single civil servant has raised alarm to put a stop to this practice, hence aiding and abetting the financial crime. A case in point is that of Joseph Inikpi, an employee of Dekina Local Government who we confirmed to be dead. Our findings further revealed that upon the death of Joseph Inikpi, a woman inherited her identity and began to enjoy her entitlements.

“This first woman subsequently transferred the benefit of late Inikpi to another woman who is currently again enjoying the benefits of late Inikpi. The first woman (now in Abuja) who inherited late Inikpi identity is the one with her passport photograph on the Employee Biodata Form whereas the second woman (now in Dekina) currently enjoying the benefits of late Inikpi is the one whose phone number is on the Employee Biodata Form.”

The screening committee also discovered double and multiple employments. The report says: “These are wicked people and officers within the state who draw salaries in multiple from either both state, local and Federal Government as well as private companies.

“The numbers of employees in the employment of State & Local Governments in this category are 114. This discovery was revealed through interfacing with NIBSS where the BVN of the individuals concerns revealed they were earning salaries from more than one source.”

It was also observed that the Local Government Education Authority (LGEA) had an over-bloated workforce, with several redundant senior officers ranging from GL12 to GL 17 who had left classroom for offices, thereby leaving the school without experienced teachers.

The officers, the report says, were employed as professional class teachers but decided to abandon their teaching profession to LGEA offices where there was no work to do.

The committee found a case where some were employment before the Kogi was created, contrary to what is contained in their employment letters.

The reports says: “This people were employed by State Universal Basic Education Board SUBEB in 1986 as teachers in Ofu LGA. Please note that Kogi State was created in August 27, 1991. The letterhead paper used for their employment between 1983 to 1991 was that of Kogi State Government, Lokoja. How this was possible is still a mystery.”

There were also age discrepancies. A worker was said to have been employed on July 9, 2008 by Ankpa LGEA whereas she was born on May 7, 1996. By implication, she was employed at the age of 12.

“She has no primary school certificate, finished SSCE in June 2014 by her records available with us,” the report found.

Also discovered were diaspora workers. The report says: “These are set of people who claimed to be in the employment of Kogi State Government, being paid salaries but are residing outside Kogi and even outside the country.

“We described these categories of people as diaspora workers because almost all withdrawals of the proceeds of their illegal salaries are made in locations outside Kogi State for several years.”

Verification challenges

According to Okala, the field work was extensive and thorough; the integrity of data tested very high, but not without challenges.

“The second aspect of the Committee’s work, which is desk review, was marred with substantial fraud and high level of irregularities. It appears that these irregularities were deliberate effort by some enemies of the state who may have infiltrated the screening committee to manipulate and embarrass the state government and, by extension, the state governor for their selfish interest,” he said.

The report says the cleared list is not 100 percent clean as “it might still harbour some potential illegal and fraudulent salary earners.”

Okala said some state and Local Government staff verification forms were deliberately muddled up.

“The only plausible explanation for this action could have been to cause apprehension among the civil servants across the state. In this category, a total of 1,016 Employee Biodata forms were found to be mixed-up and muddled up in MDAs different from where the civil servant is currently working.